Future Tense
Title: Future Tense
Genre: Post-Apocalyptic
Word Count: 635
Rating: PG
Writen for October's Genre Strech on Stringing Words.
The atmosphere between them was as frosty as the air itself. Dirt rose around their feet in the land with no sun. They moved quickly, purposefully. Faces covered to avoid breathing in any harmful particles. Not wasting the energy on conversation. It wasn't advisable to spend any longer outside than was strictly necessary.
The silence lasted until they were safely ensconced in their ramshackle shelter, where Mark pulled away the scarf from his face to stare at his companion with cold eyes.
"What?" she asked defensively, even though she knew the answer. Something in her was spoiling for a fight. These last few months had changed her greatly. Then again, they had also changed him.
"You should have backed me up," he told her, an accusatory tone in his voice. "I needed your help tonight Emily."
Others in the small room scuttled silently to other areas, giving an illusion of privacy in a place which had been anything but private for a very long time.
"What difference would it have made if I had? The ballot would have been the same."
The meeting had gone against him from the start. There were too many opposing voices. Too many people who felt exactly as she did.
"You don't know that Emily. People may have spoken up who had been too cowed by the others to say anything." He crossed the space so he was close enough for her to smell his breath. "You know I'm right. We need to try and get a message to those who can help."
"A message to who Mark? Politicians? People with power?"
A small voice cried out from the adjoining room, and Emily moved into the crèche as Mark stalked in behind her.
"Yes, the politicians," he continued in the same tone of voice, only to be met by her fierce glare and silent demand for quiet.
He relented and fumed silently, watching her stroke Jonah's hair as he cried out in his sleep, singing softly to him until his whimpers finally relented. Nobody knew if Jonah was his real name. He had never spoken a word in the short time since they found him, save for the incoherent cries in his sleep each night, and none who might have known it are still around to tell.
"Who's fault do you think all of this is Mark?" she finally asked him quietly. "Someone with a itchy finger on the button. Someone with power. Someone safe in their nice little bunker while the rest of the world burned. Do you think they have to worry about the water they drink being toxic?" She indicated little Jonah, and the other children huddled on the sparse cots around them. "More politicians probably survived in their bunkers than children in the blast zone."
"All the more reason to try and contact them now," he countered, albeit more quietly. "They'll have the resources to help. An attempt should at least have been made. Who knows when we'll get another chance now. You should have supported me." He shook his head sadly, voice dropping to no more than a whisper. "There was a time when you would have supported me."
Their relationship has not weathered the crisis well. Cold reality had swiftly taken its toll on the fantasy they once had. Watching her with Jonah brought a pang of bitterness to his heart for the future they had lost. The pain of it coloured his vision and poured fresh flame on his anger. Made him misinterpret the sudden anguish he sees on her face.
"We have to prepare for the future," he snapped, turning on his heel to stalk from the room.
He left Emily to cry silent tears alone, one hand clutched around the small misshapen bear that had once been somebody's jumper, as tufts of Jonah's hair fell from her fingers to land softly on the dirt floor below.
"There is no future."
Genre: Post-Apocalyptic
Word Count: 635
Rating: PG
Writen for October's Genre Strech on Stringing Words.
The atmosphere between them was as frosty as the air itself. Dirt rose around their feet in the land with no sun. They moved quickly, purposefully. Faces covered to avoid breathing in any harmful particles. Not wasting the energy on conversation. It wasn't advisable to spend any longer outside than was strictly necessary.
The silence lasted until they were safely ensconced in their ramshackle shelter, where Mark pulled away the scarf from his face to stare at his companion with cold eyes.
"What?" she asked defensively, even though she knew the answer. Something in her was spoiling for a fight. These last few months had changed her greatly. Then again, they had also changed him.
"You should have backed me up," he told her, an accusatory tone in his voice. "I needed your help tonight Emily."
Others in the small room scuttled silently to other areas, giving an illusion of privacy in a place which had been anything but private for a very long time.
"What difference would it have made if I had? The ballot would have been the same."
The meeting had gone against him from the start. There were too many opposing voices. Too many people who felt exactly as she did.
"You don't know that Emily. People may have spoken up who had been too cowed by the others to say anything." He crossed the space so he was close enough for her to smell his breath. "You know I'm right. We need to try and get a message to those who can help."
"A message to who Mark? Politicians? People with power?"
A small voice cried out from the adjoining room, and Emily moved into the crèche as Mark stalked in behind her.
"Yes, the politicians," he continued in the same tone of voice, only to be met by her fierce glare and silent demand for quiet.
He relented and fumed silently, watching her stroke Jonah's hair as he cried out in his sleep, singing softly to him until his whimpers finally relented. Nobody knew if Jonah was his real name. He had never spoken a word in the short time since they found him, save for the incoherent cries in his sleep each night, and none who might have known it are still around to tell.
"Who's fault do you think all of this is Mark?" she finally asked him quietly. "Someone with a itchy finger on the button. Someone with power. Someone safe in their nice little bunker while the rest of the world burned. Do you think they have to worry about the water they drink being toxic?" She indicated little Jonah, and the other children huddled on the sparse cots around them. "More politicians probably survived in their bunkers than children in the blast zone."
"All the more reason to try and contact them now," he countered, albeit more quietly. "They'll have the resources to help. An attempt should at least have been made. Who knows when we'll get another chance now. You should have supported me." He shook his head sadly, voice dropping to no more than a whisper. "There was a time when you would have supported me."
Their relationship has not weathered the crisis well. Cold reality had swiftly taken its toll on the fantasy they once had. Watching her with Jonah brought a pang of bitterness to his heart for the future they had lost. The pain of it coloured his vision and poured fresh flame on his anger. Made him misinterpret the sudden anguish he sees on her face.
"We have to prepare for the future," he snapped, turning on his heel to stalk from the room.
He left Emily to cry silent tears alone, one hand clutched around the small misshapen bear that had once been somebody's jumper, as tufts of Jonah's hair fell from her fingers to land softly on the dirt floor below.
"There is no future."